What Was, What Is, What Will
by About-Yearning
Summary: A time-turner fic that focuses less on the time-turning than on the waiting it leads to.  Sirius watches, and waits. He knows that she will go back, but what he doesn't know-what he can't let himself hope for-is that when she returns she will be his.


**UPDATE: just fixing typos. **

**Disclaimer:**** If I owned Harry Potter, Sirius would be very much alive. And probably the main character.**

**Author's Note:**** If you read this and like it, there's a companion piece called "For the Love of Moons and Nargles" about Luna and Remus. Read this one first though.**

He thinks it's hardest that first time, in the shack. She calls him "Mr. Black", and it is such a different name from what she used to-or is it will?-call him. But no, that's not right, because she isn't _her_, not now, not yet, and he can't let himself think otherwise.

It still hurts.

Because he knew this would happen. For all that they say, it wasn't just Remus who had the brains, and he _could_ read between the lines. Somewhere inside him, Sirius has been waiting for this moment. But that doesn't make it any easier, because his memories have an expiration date, and somehow he just can't believe that this delicate...thing...between them will be allowed to survive. So, like one of those ticking muggle killing devices, he waits for the explosion.

And then it is summer, and time for the rats again, and the cold and the snow and the dirt and the running. It is easy to put her out of his mind when the other child-who-reminds-him-of-someone-he-used-to-know is in trouble, and he is drowning in regret for that boy now. _Harry_. So he wears the mantle of godfather as proudly as he can from beyond the castle walls, because it is the only title he can let himself be called. Now, at least. She is still so very young...

Remus comes, sometimes. And it pains him, because although the boy is still there, beneath the grey and scars, he is overlaid with flickering images of grief and loss and time. It reminds Sirius of all that he has lost, and how far the distance can be between two people who stand so close.

But firewhiskey is a timeless bridge, and late night recollections a poor man's medicine, so slowly he feels the wounds heal. Beneath a crescent moon, a convict and a werewolf laugh, and maybe, just maybe it will all work out.

But no. How can it. Because _he's _back, and Peter is free, and beyond the edges of his eyelids Sirius can feel his cousin laughing. It's not that he's scared (_Bella, once-pretty Bella with the crazy eyes. Were you always evil?)_, but it's that he knows he has been waging a losing battle since the day he was born against those that gave him life, and if there's anyone to end that fight, it will be her.

Still. The Phoenix rises from the ashes, after all, and now he's here. Yes, back in that god-forsaken hell, so much worse because it is his hell, the one over which he was born to be Satan. But even hell can't fight Molly Weasley, aggravating woman she may be, and now Harry is coming. Harry! And he's bringing _her..._

Oh god. How could he have thought it worse that first time? Because it's near unbearable now. She's here, so close: the scent of peaches as her hair brushes his cheek in a gentle hug. Soft, casual. _Harry's godfather. Harry's godfather._ _When did that perfect phrase become a curse? _That same voice, raised in sweet, young anger over some reckless action of Sirius'. It is worse now. She's older, the soft curves of what will come showing slightly, and he has to look away because she is older but not old enough. Not yet. And he thanks every star above for Remus then, and knows at once that they are back, friends, the last of the Marauders, because the werewolf doesn't mock, and doesn't preach. Just smiles in sad understanding, clasps his shoulder, and waits with him for the girl that only they can now remember.

Then, they are fighting. Phoenix to Snake, child to adult, in the place where ghosts whisper. He can hear them, calling out from beyond the veil, and he almost wants to fall. But no, he can't, because the boy-who-lives-for-those-he-loved is still living, and she hasn't gone yet, and how can he die when he hasn't gotten to kiss her again? Too cruel, too cruel, but so fitting-what he has feared, to die before memory becomes reality.

And Sirius very nearly does.

But instead it is the other blood-traitor cousin. His favorite pink-haired girl. The one he is only now beginning to know, and oh Merlin it _aches_. Because that should have been him, it should've, and why can't he protect even one?

If it is bad for him, it is worse for his godson. The one who feels guilt for everything, deserved or not. The one who brought them here, though Sirius thinks this with no malice and no resentment, because how can he resent the boy's love for himself?

And then Harry is running after the screaming witch who shares Sirius' own blood.

And they follow, the Phoenixes, but they can't do a thing, just watch.

In the end, it is love and Dumbledore. Isn't it always? And Harry is guided off by the two of them, Sirius and the white-haired old man who has seen too much.

Harry learns of the prophecy that day, in the Headmaster's office. The boy yells, and smashes priceless things, and cries about the death whose blame he can't help but shoulder. And Sirius feels an intense anger that the old man who seems to twinkle so wisely couldn't have listened to Sirius' own pleas. That he couldn't have told the boy before it was too late. But Sirius can't be mad for too long, because all the man was trying to do was spare the boy a little pain, and if there is anyone who understands that it is Sirius.

The next year passes quickly, much more so than the last. Perhaps it is because his name is finally his own (for the first time, really, because he is the last, and so can make Black mean whatever he wants it to) and because for once the Ministry has done something right, and set him free. Perhaps it is because he can leave the house called Hell, and do things, real missions. But perhaps (and a little, selfish voice in the back of his head says that yes, this is the real reason) it is because he knows that somewhere off in that castle a girl with bushy hair is becoming the love he so misses.

Then, lightning strikes. The tower crumbles. How can he, _he, Dumbledore_ be dead. It is a mark of how much this feels like the end of the world that Sirius doesn't even think "I told you so." Grief like this is no place for a childhood (although that's wrong, because really it was a lifetime) grudge.

And then...

The children are gone before Sirius can do anything. And he knows they aren't children anymore, haven't been for quite some time, but he doesn't care, just hates himself anyways because _how could he not have known,_ and _why didn't you take me with you? _He can't let them die, and he won't, not out there alone. But he knows, somewhere deep inside, that Harry left without him because the part of Harry that is a man couldn't let another father die, and the part that is a child wanted a home to return to, if there is anything to return.

Still, Sirius searches. Remus too, because Remus hasn't stopped searching since the day the other cousin died. Pink-haired. Too young, too whole, gone before they even had a chance. Sirius understands, and this time it is his hand clasping the shoulder.

They search together, and find them briefly at a cottage by a lake, where the-boy-who-lived-and-is-now-a-man buries an elf by hand. The three of them-he can't call them children anymore, so he names them, slowly, so as to really understand who they've become: _Ron. Harry. Hermione.-_-won't say much. But there is a hard, blazing look in Hermione's eyes, and fresh scars on her face. Scars that he recognizes with a jolt from so long ago, and that look, that look-

he knows, now, how the girl that showed up on his quidditch pitch so long ago got those scars. Why she flinched when certain Slytherins passed her in the hall. Why she kissed him like it couldn't last.

And everything inside him wells up in a fierce mixture of ecstactic joy and pure determination. Because, somewhere, in between screaming on a cold floor and being rescued by a tiny elf she went and came back.

She is back.

And he will survive the battle that is coming, because he can't die without another of her kisses.

She leaves that night, with the other two, off to find whatever they are seeking. She doesn't say goodbye, or hello, and doesn't kiss him. Just stares again, in that hard, blazing way. And he knows she will make it through.

She does. And he does. There is a moment there, a horrible, heart-clenching moment when a Dark Lord holds the body of a boy-who-lived up to a crowd and say he lives no more. But it is a lie of course, unknown to him, and even Sirius can't help but smile in sudden, joyful (if nauseous) understanding when his godson explains to the rapt murderer minutes later why his greatest servant was a traitor.

There is pandemonium after the final, fateful curse. There is a tearful but manly reunion between godfather and godson. But then Sirius steps back, because it is clear that what Harry needs is a moment with the two who were with him all the way. Later, there will be time for more.

And there is, of course. There's time, finally, oh god oh Merlin finally, for that kiss.

He's scared, suddenly, because he's different now-he has lost so much-but she is still the same, still young and beautiful, though never scarless. But it doesn't matter, she tells him so, and she is laughing and crying at once as she says, simply, that somehow she knew. She always knew, and without him-the older him, the one that is so very in the now, and so very scared-she couldn't have loved him in the first place. Or is it the last place? They're both laughing and crying now, because this is time at it its most inscrutable, and damn is it confusing.

Months later, she is simply crying, but it is with joy, as he slips the ring on her finger. He still can't believe it, because how can it be that this, their love (he can finally name it as such, and oh the freedom is unbelievable) can really be allowed to last. But he has stopped looking over his shoulder, and as he looks around he realizes that this, _this_, is what happily ever after means. Because the boy-man, really-who is a reminder of those he lost, but in the best possible way, is smiling at him next to the redhead who looks so like Lily. And his last brother, the werewolf who is more a man than so many others, is also smiling, with his arm around the strange, fae-like blond with the vegetable earrings. Sirius can't quite help a laugh, then, at the thought that there are two moons in Moony's life, the one that takes away love, and the one that gives it.

And then, there is her.

The girl with the bushy hair. The beautiful, brilliant know-it-all. The girl who saved his life before she knew what she was saving. The one he has waited for for longer than he has known her, but it doesn't matter because at the same time he knows he has been waiting for her his whole life, and possibly before. She is all he knows.

And he smiles.

Everything will be alright,

he can feel it.

**Reviews are always lovely!**


End file.
